From the Los Angeles area take the 5 Freeway north to the 14 Freeway north. Take the Pearblossom Highway exit. Turn right on Barrel Springs Road, right on Cheseboro Road, left on Mount Emma Road, right on Fort Tejon Road, right on 131st Street/Longview Road, left on Tumbleweed Road and continue on to Devil’s Punchbowl Road.

Sometimes, California’s most interesting spots are the toughest ones to get to.

And if you forget your directions, you’ll have a devil of a time finding this place.

But that’s somehow appropriate, seeing as it’s called the Devil’s Punchbowl Natural Area. So what exactly is Devil’s Punchbowl, you ask?

I’d say it’s one of those awe-inspiring places — a place that makes you realize how small and insignificant all of us are.

But that’s just me talking.

A more nuts-and-bolts description would say that it’s a 1,310-acre Los Angeles County park on the northern slopes of the San Gabriel Mountains near Littlerock. A place chock-full of pines, California junipers, desert chaparral, Joshua trees and awe-inspiring rock formations.

With a heavy emphasis on “awe-inspiring.”

My wife and I returned to Devil’s Punchbowl last week after having first gone there a couple of years ago, and I have to say the place is even better the second time around.

When you enter the park off Devil’s Punchbowl Road you are greeted by a swath of crazily tilted rocks that punched their way up through the desert floor millions of years ago.

That rock formation is eerily similar to Vasquez Rocks in Agua Dulce. But stay tuned because there’s plenty more to see once you get deeper into the park. The main attraction is the Punchbowl’s massive canyon, which plunges 300 feet down to a creek that threads its way through the park.

A lookout point near the visitor center at the top provides a stunning view of the canyon. But the best way to experience Devil’s Punchbowl is to take the one-mile hike that winds its way through the upper and lower reaches of the bowl. The trek is relatively easy although you’ll have to do some climbing to make your way back up to the top.

Along the way, you’ll slide between boulders and scrub brush with amazing views of the surrounding mountain peaks, some of which tower 8,000 feet into the air. There was snow in the mountains the day we were there, which added to the ambience.

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More ambitious hikers can take the 14-mile Burkhart Trail, which leads deeper into the mountains. But keep in mind that’s 28 miles round-trip.

So you’re probably looking at a two-day hike. Unless you feel incredibly energetic, that is.

Volunteers were manning the visitor center the day we arrived and they were full of information about the park, its origins and the kinds of things you can do there. They were joined by “Ruth,” a beautiful white owl that was rescued as a baby. Ruth serves as an ambassador to the park, doing her part to help educate visitors about the wildlife.

We also saw a climber making his way up one of the sheer sandstone walls at the base of the canyon.

Using a rope and metal pitons as anchors to prevent a long fall, his progress was slow and calculated. And it provided some scale to illustrate how just massive those walls are.

After making his way to a point about 120 feet above the creek bed, he rappeled back down. He had climbed less than a third of the way up.

Devil’s Punchbowl was formed about 60 million years ago beneath a shallow ocean. When the water retreated, large boulders tumbled into the resulting canyon area, creating the unique landscape visitors see today.

Horizontal compression forced some of the nearby sandstone layers to bend and twist, creating the skewed and tilted rocks visitors see at the park’s entrance. The San Andreas Fault lies just to the north of the park.

Other park visitors include gray foxes, which can sometimes be seen in the early morning or dusk, as well as deer, bobcats, chipmunks, ground squirrels and rattlesnakes.

The area is also home to mountain lions and bears. But I wisely decided I wasn’t about to go looking for them.

Admission to Devil’s Punchbowl is free and the park offers a variety of activities, including moonlight hikes, telescope programs, San Andreas Fault tours, school field trips and nature center tours.

If you’re looking for a fun one-day adventure within easy driving distance of the greater Los Angeles area, this is it.